STOREHOUSES FOR APPLES 231 



A pail of this size is not too heavy to handle even on high ladders, 

 and it carries the fruit without bruising. Our plan is to pick and 

 sort into boxes in the orchard. If a number of pickers are at work, 

 then one or more men will do the sorting. As each picker fills his 

 pail, he carries it a short distance to the sorting station, taking an 

 empty one and returning to his work. The apples are sorted out 

 of the pails and very carefully examined. The perfect apples go 

 into one box, seconds into another and culls into another. They 

 are then loaded onto a truck or wagon with springs and hauled to 

 the house. A good sorter will keep pails empty for several pick- 

 ers, all of course depending on the crop, size of apples, etc. I put 

 my winter apples in redwood boxes, which, when piled one on top 

 of another, five or six high and close together, and covered with 

 canvas or muslin, are in a condition to keep their flavor and juici- 

 ness a long time. Storing apples in boxes saves a lot of work in 

 handling if they are to be examined or sorted during the winter. 



Nearly all the ways of keeping winter apples have been tried 

 in California. The main difficulty in keeping apples in good con- 

 dition during the dry months of the autumn is the loss of moisture 

 from the fruit by evaporation. This causes shriveling and operates 

 against long keeping. It has been found by experience that apples 

 keep perfectly until late in the spring by piling under the trees 

 and covering with leaves, etc., allowing the rains to fall upon them. 

 When dry north winds blow, the fruit should be sprinkled occa- 

 sionally. They come out from the cover fresh, smooth, and 

 plump, and for family use such rough storage will often answer 

 a good purpose. For commercial storage, even on a small scale, 

 however, good fruithouses are used. The requisites of such houses 

 are an evenly cool temperature, moist air, and good ventilation, the 

 fruit being open to free access of the air. In the mountains where 

 stone is abundant excellent apple houses are made of it, which 

 resist temperature changes notably. 



Mr. Edward Berwick, of Monterey, apple grower of experience 

 in the coast region, handles his fruit in this way : 



The apples are carefully -hand-picked into baskets and at once trans- 

 ferred to ordinary apple boxes just put in loose, not packed tight as for 

 shipping. These boxes are hauled to the frivt house with as little jar as 

 possible. 



This fruit house is built of rough boards (fastened on a heavy frame) 

 with inch-thick battens covering the cracks, and rustic-nailed outside the 

 battens, thus leaving an inch air-space between the boards and the rustic. 

 It is of two stories the upper devoted to tools and stores, the lower used 

 for fruit, and arranged with shelves accordingly. This lower story has 

 only an earthen floor. One object of this is to give as lodgment for rats 

 or mice, the other is to serve as a means of maintaining a cool, damp 

 atmosphere. To this end it is kept well watered in apple-keeping season; 

 and, to avoid mildew or mold, it is also liberally sprinkled with ground 

 sulphur. By day doors and windows arc mostly kept shut, by night open; 

 this, of course, is to exclude the heat and allow free circulation of the cool 

 night air. 



